Hurricane Katrina Motivates Study

(AP) - A think tank is calling for a legislativechange that would authorize a presidential appointee to take chargeof the government's response to major disasters like HurricaneKatrina. A report released Tuesday by the Rockefeller Institute ofGovernment urges Congress to amend the Stafford Act and create aposition for an "officer-in-charge" who reports directly to thepresident after a "megadisaster." The report says Katrina demonstrated the need for having astrong, independent leader in charge of coordinating federal, stateand local governments' response to a disaster. The institute is the public policy research arm of the StateUniversity of New York. Its report is the product of a three-yearstudy of how Gulf Coast governments responded to the August 2005hurricane.